Paving is an ancient art, practised by ancient civilisations. Some examples of their work exist to this day.
The pavers of ancient is were generally made of natural materials. In modern times, pavers can be constructed from many different materials, including natural stone, and in more recent times clay pavers have become particularly important to the building industry.
Clay pavers are generally made from kiln fired clay. It is a commonly misunderstood that because the clay is fired, the clay would not continue to act as it would in the unfired state. In fact, all clay, whether fired or unfired, grows or swells, and contracts, according to moisture conditions existing in the environment. Fired clay pavers continue to grow and swell. However, they do so at a much slower rate compared with unfired clay or clay in the natural state.
Whilst this will not cause problems for the owners of the sites on which clay pavers have been laid, particularly within a few years of completion, the problem becomes evident over a longer time, because adjacent pavers rise off their base and the previously level or smooth surface becomes uneven.
Whilst layers have been aware of this problem for some time, they persist in laying clay pavers side by side, without any gap between them. This is generally a recipe for disaster, but the layers are somewhat uninterested as the difficulties occur many years after the original laying, at which time the problems fall on the shoulders of the paver manufacturers. The layers are also not interested in laying pavers with a space between them as this increases the overall time required for the task. Whilst the industry acknowledges the problem no attempts to date have been successful in providing a solution.
Paving is a difficult art, which generally requires the person paving to set a straight edge or line at regular intervals to square up the job. This adds significantly to the time required to complete large paving tasks. The additional time is exacerbated by the need to be continuously filling the voids between adjacent pavers so as to prevent any movement when they are walked on. Walking on the job is necessary sometimes in order to square up the job properly.
Another difficulty is that sand which is swept into the voids between adjacent pavers can be washed away. This will cause spacing difficulties which tend to become highly visible and detract from the appearance of the pavement.
It is an object of the invention to at least in part alleviate one or more of the problems noted above.